This book took one of the most sensational crimes to ever happen in the state of Virginia and managed to turn it into an absolute snoozefest. It escapes me as to how this book won "awards," and the only two excuses with which I can come up are that it must have been the only book nominated or the author clearly knew people on the committee that awarded the prize. The only suspense here is whether or not the next page will finally be the last, and the only horror is the poor organization and writing style. I'm convinced the author did not have an editor, or his editor backed out upon receipt of the first rambling pages. The story is loosely constructed and flows worse than a clogged toilet. This story would have been fantastic if it were taut, organized, and succinct; instead, we have a rambling Dickensian-style non-fiction fiasco that never holds one's interest. When it finally seems to be on course and point in moving the story along, albeit with still more pages than necessary, the author randomly throws in a disheveled chapter that completely takes the plot off-course, something that has nothing at all to do with where he is in the flow of the story, like a chapter on the upbringings of the prosecuting attorney thrown into the middle of an extradition storyline, or the vapid description of a prison in London after a chapter on the arraignment of the two suspects. It never works, and it's very sad. The story should have taken 200 pages, maximum, to tell. I struggled to hold my eyes open at any point to finish. I must congratulate the author, however. As I said, he took one of the most sensational murder stories of the twentieth century, one that involved extradition and involvement of at least three nations, and made it a bedtime story that I forced myself to finish. That's deflation, not suspense or a thrilling read. Read Wikipedia or google the murderers. You'll find better writing than this rambling wreck of a book.
